Page:Balkan Short Stories.djvu/185

Rh not try to know if the new light upon her face was merely that of the rising day. “Naja! Naja!” I exclaimed triumphantly, and started toward her. Just then some one called me. I heard loud, merry laughter. I turned and saw my friend Geza, the landowner, behind me. He was a hunter, too, and fond of playing pranks. I was ashamed and wondered if he had heard my shout of triumph. I breathed easier when I learned from his conversation that he thought it was just an ordinary love affair. I went with him, and I did not dare look back toward Naja.

Later that day I did not meet her, nor the next nor the next. On the fourth day I was summoned to a distant place. There I remained four months and probably I should have stayed longer, had I not been summoned to the district court.

Twelve hours later I learned how important the affair was. In Naja’s village the peasants had risen in revolt against the land allotment. The plowmen of the landed proprietors who tried to plow the fields which had belonged to the peasants were knocked down and beaten. The peasants took the village elders, the mayor and the pope, and shut them up in a guard house. Military aid